Brazil’s Lula to build trade ties on Japan state visit

POST-GLOBALIZATION; A MULTIPOLAR WORLD

By AFP
March 24, 2025


Brazil's President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva is seeking to ramp up exports to Japan - Copyright AFP/File EVARISTO SA

Brazil’s president starts a four-day state visit to Japan on Monday, accompanied by a 100-strong business delegation as US tariffs push the countries to nurture trade ties elsewhere.

Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba are also expected to discuss the joint development of biofuels ahead of November’s COP30 UN climate summit in the Brazilian Amazon.

In talks on Wednesday, the leaders will reportedly restate their commitment to free trade following US President Donald Trump’s levies on steel and other imports.

“Everyone who was talking about free trade is now practising protectionism,” Lula, 79, said ahead of his departure.

“I think this protectionism is absurd,” he told Japanese media.

Brazil is the second-largest exporter of steel to the United States after Canada, shipping four million tonnes of the metal in 2024.

Lula and Ishiba will likely agree to regular leaders’ visits and to establishing strategic dialogue on security and other matters, Japanese media reported.

The pair may also affirm the importance of the rules-based international order, a phrase often used to make a veiled dig at Chinese foreign policy.

– Beef to planes –

A welcome ceremony will be held for the left-wing president on Tuesday at Tokyo’s Imperial Palace, followed by a state banquet that evening.

It will be Lula’s third visit to Japan, the world’s fourth-largest economy, as president of Brazil.

Ramping up Brazilian exports to Japan — from beef to planes — is a key objective for Lula, who on Wednesday will attend an economic forum aimed at forging new opportunities.

China is currently Brazil’s top trading partner, with Japan trailing behind as its 11th largest partner globally, according to Brazilian officials.

Brazil has “increased its commercial dependence on China in recent years”, Karina Calandrin, a professor at business school Ibmec in Sao Paulo, told AFP.

But since taking office in January, Trump has slapped tariffs amounting to a 20 percent hike on Chinese overseas shipments, which last year reached record levels.

This, Calandrin said, “puts Brazil at risk, making it more vulnerable to any change in the international scenario”.

Yet efforts to diversify foreign trade could prove difficult given the South American powerhouse’s “structural dependence” on commerce with China, said Roberto Goulart, an international relations professor at Brasilia University.

A more balanced trade landscape for Brazil in the Asia-Pacific region is unlikely in “the short term”, he said.

Meanwhile, Tokyo could see stronger ties with Brasilia as a way to keep Brazil from forming a closer relationship with China and Russia, fellow members of the BRICS emerging economies bloc.

– Apology –

Brazil is home to the world’s largest Japanese diaspora, a holdover of mass migration in the early 20th century.

Last year, Lula’s government issued a historic apology for its persecution of Japanese immigrants during and after World War II.

Thousands living along the coast of Sao Paulo were forced off of their land in 1943, while at least 150 Japanese immigrants and their offspring later wound up incarcerated on a remote island.

An apology is “the least we can do to acknowledge our mistakes in the past”, Lula told Japanese media ahead of the trip.

NAKBA 2.0

West Bank Palestinians in ‘extremely precarious’ situation: MSF


By AFP
March 24, 2025


Thousands of West Bank Palestinians have been displaced since January 21, when the Israeli army launched an operation targeting Palestinian armed groups - Copyright AFP JAAFAR ASHTIYEH

Doctors Without Borders (MSF) denounced on Monday the “extremely precarious” situation of Palestinians displaced by the ongoing Israeli military operation in the occupied West Bank.

According to the United Nations, some 40,000 residents have been displaced since January 21, when the Israeli army launched an operation targeting Palestinian armed groups in the north of the territory.

The West Bank, occupied by Israel since 1967, is home to about three million Palestinians as well as nearly 500,000 Israelis living in settlements that are illegal under international law.

The Israeli operation started two days after a truce agreement came into effect in the Gaza Strip between the Israeli military and the Palestinian territory’s Hamas rulers.

The situation of the displaced Palestinians is “extremely precarious”, said MSF, which is operating in the area.

Palestinians “are without proper shelter, essential services, and access to healthcare”, the NGO said.

“The mental health situation is alarming.”

In a statement to AFP, the Israeli military (IDF) said it had been operating “against all terrorist organizations, including Hamas, in a complex security reality”.

“The IDF follows international law and takes feasible precautions to mitigate harm to uninvolved individuals,” the statement said.

MSF said the scale of forced displacement and destruction of camps “has not been seen in decades” in the West Bank.

“People are unable to return to their homes as Israeli forces have blocked access to the camps, destroying homes and infrastructure,” said MSF Director of Operations Brice de la Vingne.

“Israel must stop this, and the humanitarian response needs to be scaled up.”

Dubbed “Iron Wall”, the Israeli operation is primarily targeting three refugee camps — Jenin, Tulkarem and Nur Shams — and defence minister Israel Katz said in February it would last several months.

“I have instructed (the soldiers) to prepare for a prolonged stay in the evacuated camps for the coming year, and not to allow the return of their residents or the resurgence of terrorism,” he said in a statement.

Pushing effort to sack security chief, Israel PM alleges anti-govt plot

By AFP
March 24, 2025


Anti-government demonstrators protest outside the Israeli prime minister's office in Jerusalem during the meeting for a vote of no confidence against Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara - Copyright AFP Menahem KAHANA

Israel’s prime minister, pushing to dismiss internal security chief Ronen Bar, on Monday alleged an attempt to bring down his government after Israeli media reported Bar’s agency spent months probing far-right infiltration of the police.

The police are under the supervision of far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir. The minister opposed a ceasefire in Gaza but rejoined the government last week when Israel resumed intensive bombing of the Palestinian territory in its war against Hamas.

In his latest accusation against Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused Bar of investigating Ben Gvir without his approval.

Netanyahu is pressing ahead with proceedings to sack Bar, a move which the Supreme Court blocked on Friday and sparked protests around Israel.

“The claim that the prime minister authorised Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar to gather evidence against minister Itamar Ben Gvir is yet another exposed lie,” Netanyahu said.

“The document that was published, which shows an explicit directive from the head of Shin Bet to collect evidence against the political echelon, resembles dark regimes, undermines the foundations of democracy, and aims to bring down the right-wing government”, Netanyahu’s office said in a statement.

The accusation came the day after Netanyahu’s government began proceedings to sack Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara, and two days after Bar’s firing on Friday. The Supreme Court froze Bar’s dismissal that same day.

Ben Gvir reacted on X, calling Bar a “criminal” and a “liar, who is now trying to deny his attempt to conspire against elected officials in a democratic country, even after the documents were revealed to the public and the world.”

The unprecedented moves to dismiss the Shin Bet chief and now the attorney general have widened divisions in the country as Israel resumes its military operations in the Gaza Strip.

A reignited protest movement has seen demonstrators accuse the prime minister of threatening democracy.

Netanyahu has cited an “ongoing lack of trust” in Bar and insists it is up to the government who will head Shin Bet.



– Adversary of the far-right –



Bar’s calls against “Jewish terrorism” in parts of the Israeli-occupied West Bank and his warnings to Ben Gvir not to enter Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa mosque compound were among factors that made him an adversary of Netanyahu’s far-right ministers.

The Supreme Court froze Bar’s dismissal after the filing of appeals, including from opposition leader Yair Lapid’s centre-right Yesh Atid party.

The opposition appeal highlighted what critics see as the two main reasons Netanyahu moved against Bar.

The first was his criticism of the government over the security failure that allowed Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, the deadliest day in the country’s history.

The second was what the opposition appeal said is a Shin Bet investigation of Netanyahu’s close associates on suspicion of receiving money linked to Qatar.

Netanyahu’s office has dismissed such accusations as “fake news”.

Israel’s cabinet passed a vote of no confidence on Sunday against Baharav-Miara, the first step in a process to dismiss her.

Netanyahu’s office has cited “significant and prolonged differences between the government and the government’s legal adviser,” a role which the attorney general has.

Following the Supreme Court’s initial ruling in the Bar case, Baharav-Miara said Netanyahu cannot name a new internal security chief and is “prohibited to take any action that harms” his position.

Journalist working with Al Jazeera killed in Israeli Gaza strike, network says


By AFP
March 24, 2025


Relatives mourn Palestinian journalist Hussam Shabat during his funeral at the Indonesian Hospital in Beit Lahia, northern Gaza - Copyright AFP BASHAR TALEB

Al Jazeera said on Monday that a journalist working with one of its channels was killed in an Israeli strike on his vehicle in northern Gaza.

“Hussam Shabat, a journalist collaborating with Al Jazeera Mubasher, was martyred in an Israeli strike targeting his car in the northern Gaza Strip,” an Al Jazeera alert said, referring to the network’s live Arabic channel.

The territory’s civil defence agency confirmed his death, as well as that of Muhammad Mansour, an employee of the Islamic Jihad-affiliated Palestine Today TV.

The agency said Shabat was targeted by an Israeli drone strike on his car on Monday afternoon near a petrol station in the northern town of Beit Lahia.

It said Mansour was killed in a separate airstrike on his home in the southern city of Khan Yunis in the morning.

Mahmud Bassal, spokesman for the civil defence agency, said airstrikes had targeted more than 10 cars in various areas of the Gaza Strip.

In a statement, the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate called the deaths of Shabat and Mansour “a crime added to the record of Israeli terrorism”.

“This horrific war crime aims to obscure the truth and terrorise all those who carry the message of free speech,” it added.

It said that more than 206 journalists and media workers had been killed since the start of the war, triggered by Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.

Israel restarted intense air strikes across the densely populated Gaza Strip last week followed by ground operations, shattering the relative calm of a six-week ceasefire agreement with Hamas.

The health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza said Monday that 730 people had been killed since Israel resumed bombardments on March 18, including 57 in the past 24 hours.

Earlier in March, Gaza’s civil defence agency said nine people including journalists were killed in Israeli strikes in the north of the territory, an attack Hamas denounced as a “blatant violation” of the fragile ceasefire.

Conservatives target Trump as Canada Federal Election campaign kicks off


By AFP
March 24, 2025


Canadian Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre speaks in Ottawa on March 4, 2025 - Copyright AFP Dave Chan

Ben Simon

Canada’s Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre argued Monday that he is the strongest candidate to take on US President Donald Trump, whose annexation and tariff threats have shaken the once promising chances of a Tory-led government.

The leading candidates ahead of Canada’s April 28 election fanned out on the first full day of campaigning in a vote certain to be dominated by Trump.

Liberal leader and Prime Minister Mark Carney, who replaced Justin Trudeau earlier this month, was in the eastern province of Newfoundland, saying Canadians needed to view the United States as “a friendship lost.”

Trump’s return, while potentially devastating for Canada’s economy, appears to have boosted the Liberals, with several polls showing them as a slight favorite, a stunning turnaround from early January when the Conservatives looked headed for a landslide.

Poilievre built significant support as a relentless critic of an unpopular Trudeau government, but Trump’s return and Trudeau’s departure have forced the Conservatives to pivot.

Flanked by his wife and two young children at a packaging plant outside Toronto, Poilievre fought back against perceptions that Carney was the better counter to Trump.

“There’s a reason why Donald Trump wants the weak, out of touch Liberals in power. They have handed him control of our economy,” Poilievre said, an apparent references to Trump’s recent comment that he would “rather deal with a liberal” in Canada.

“I know that people are scared, they feel threatened… and now they are facing these unjustified threats from President Trump who quite frankly needs to knock it off,” Poilievre said.

He pledged tax cuts to boost the economy so Canada can “confront Donald Trump and the Americans from a position of strength.”

Political analysts have argued that to win Poilievre may need to re-center the campaign on non-Trump issues that made the Liberals vulnerable after a decade in power, like soaring housing costs.

But given Trump’s primacy in Canadian politics, Poilievre has increasingly taken aim at the president.

For Conservative supporter Valerie Orr, 81, Trump’s dominance in the campaign is unhelpful.

“This threat from the south has diverted too much attention,” she told AFP in a parking lot outside the Poilievre event.

“Who ever heard of a state the size of Canada… Come on, be real,” she said, praising the Conservative leader for focusing on the challenges people face trying to “make it through the week.”



– Friendship ‘lost,’ ‘strained’ –



Carney, who previously led the central banks in Canada and England, has tried to position himself as a departure from Trudeau and a seasoned economic crisis manager.

He spoke on Monday in Gander, a town that sheltered thousands of Americans whose trans-Atlantic flights were abruptly forced to land there after the September 11 attacks.

“Canadians did extraordinary things for Americans when they needed it. Now, we need to do extraordinary things for ourselves,” he said.

“In this crisis caused by the US president and those who are enabling him, we lament a friendship lost, or at least a friendship strained,” he added.

Trump has threatened, withdrawn and imposed a dizzying array of tariffs on Canadian goods, with more levies expected next week, triggering a trade war economists say could plunge Canada into a recession.

His tariffs and repeated threats to turn Canada into the 51st US state, combined with Trudeau’s departure have upended Canadian politics.

On January 6, the day Trudeau announced his plans to leave office, the Liberals held 20.1 percent support with the Conservatives at 44.2 percent, according to aggregated polling data from the public broadcaster CBC.

On Monday, the Liberals were at 37.8 percent and the Tories stood at 37.2.

The data shows the Carney-led Liberals have eaten into support for the left-wing New Democrats, who progressives may not trust to take on Trump.

Trump to impose sharp tariff on countries buying Venezuelan oil

TRUMP TARIFF TERRORISM

By AFP
March 24, 2025


US President Donald Trump holds cabinet meeting 

- Copyright AFP Brendan SMIALOWSKI

Beiyi SEOW and Becca MILFELD

US President Donald Trump announced Monday steep tariffs on imports from countries buying oil and gas from Venezuela, a punitive measure that could hit China and India, among others, and sow fresh global trade uncertainty.

Since returning to the White House in January, Trump has unleashed tariffs on US allies and foes alike, attempting to strong-arm both economic and diplomatic policy.

The latest across-the-board 25 percent levies targeting buyers of Venezuelan oil will come into effect April 2, Trump said on his Truth Social platform.

These could hit China and India, with experts noting that Venezuela exports oil to both those countries, as well as the United States and Spain.

Trump has dubbed the date “Liberation Day” for the world’s biggest economy, already promising reciprocal tariffs tailored to each trading partner in an effort to remedy practices that Washington deem unfair.

He earlier also said sector-specific duties would come around the same day — but the White House said Monday it might take a more targeted approach.

In his latest announcement involving Venezuela, the president cited “numerous reasons” for what he called a “secondary tariff.”

He accused Venezuela of “purposefully and deceitfully” sending “undercover, tens of thousands of high level, and other, criminals” to the United States.

He added in his post that “Venezuela has been very hostile to the United States and the Freedoms which we espouse.”

Under past rounds of sanctions, Venezuela had been able to shift exports to major economies like China and India.

Trump’s announcement comes as the deportation pipeline between the United States and Venezuela was suspended last month when Trump claimed Caracas had not lived up to a deal to quickly receive deported migrants.

Venezuela subsequently said it would no longer accept the flights.

But Caracas said Saturday that it had reached agreement with Washington to resume repatriations after which nearly 200 Venezuelan citizens were deported from the United States via Honduras.

Separately Monday, the Trump administration extended US oil giant Chevron’s deadline to halt its operations in Venezuela through May 27.

The company had been operating in Venezuela under a sanctions waiver previously granted.



– Narrower focus? –



Trump’s latest move adds to tariffs he has vowed would start on or around April 2.

Besides reciprocal tariffs, he has promised sweeping sector-specific duties hitting imported automobiles, pharmaceuticals and semiconductors.

As things stand, however, his plans for the day might become more targeted.

Sector-specific tariffs “may or may not happen April 2,” a White House official told AFP, adding that the situation is “still fluid.”

But the official reaffirmed that reciprocal tariffs would take place.

Trump told reporters Monday he would announce car tariffs “very shortly” and on pharmaceuticals sometime down the line.

US partners are furthering talks with Washington as deadlines loom, with EU trade chief Maros Sefcovic heading to the country Tuesday to meet his American counterparts — Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and trade envoy Jamieson Greer.

Hopes of a narrower tariff rollout earlier gave financial markets a boost.

The White House has vowed to impose “big tariffs” on April 2 in a major escalation of Trump’s trade war, saying that “America has been ripped off by every country around the world.”

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told Fox Business’ Maria Bartiromo last week that Washington would go to trading partners with an indication of where tariff levels and non-tariff barriers are.

If countries stopped their practices, Bessent added, they could potentially avoid levies.

In the same interview, Bessent noted levies would be focused on about 15 percent of countries who have trade imbalances with the United States, dubbing these a “dirty 15.”

Hyundai announces new $21 billion investment in US manufacturing

TRUMP TARIFF GRIFT


By AFP
March 24, 2025


Hyundai has announced a new multi-billion-dollar investment in US manufacturing - Copyright AFP Jung Yeon-je

South Korean auto giant Hyundai on Monday announced a multi-billion-dollar investment in the United States, including a new $5.8 billion steel plant.

The plant, which will be based in the US state of Louisiana, “will create 1,300 American jobs,” Hyundai executive chairman Euisun Chung told reporters at a White House event alongside President Donald Trump.

The move will also serve “as the foundation for a more self-reliant and secure automotive supply chain in the US,” he added.

Hyundai’s announcement makes it the latest firm to announce plans to invest billions of dollars into the United States since Donald Trump’s return to power in January.

The US president has repeatedly threatened to impose painful tariffs on companies that do not relocate manufacturing jobs to the United States from overseas.

In response, domestic and foreign firms, including Apple and Oracle, have announced plans to invest hundreds of billions of dollars into US projects over the next four years.

“Cars are coming to this country at levels never seen before,” Trump told reporters on Monday.

The investment was “a clear demonstration that tariffs very strongly work,” he said.

“Hyundai will be producing steel in America and making its cars in America, and as a result, they’ll not have to pay any tariffs,” he added.

GENDER APARTHIED

Afghan women risk Taliban wrath over hair trade


By AFP
March 24, 2025


Until Taliban authorities took power in Afghanistan, women were able to freely sell their hair to be made into wigs - Copyright AFP Claire GOUNON

Claire GOUNON

Until Taliban authorities took power in Afghanistan, women like Fatima were able to freely sell their hair to be made into wigs, bringing in crucial cash.

But a ban last year has forced the 28-year-old and others to covertly trade hair — collected from shower drains or the salon floor — braving the risk of punishment one strand at a time.

“I need this money,” said Fatima, 28, one of the few women still in paid private employment in Kabul after the Taliban regained control in 2021.

“I can treat myself to something or buy things for the house.”

The woman, who withholds her last name for security reasons, sells every 100 grams of hair for little more than $3, a small addition to her monthly salary of $100.

Buyers who want to export the locks for wig production abroad “would knock on our doors to collect” the hair, she said.

One of those buyers is a man, who also requested anonymity, sending the manes to Pakistan and China from Afghanistan, one of the world’s poorest countries.

Taliban authorities have cracked down on the rights of women, imposing what the UN calls a “gender apartheid”.

They banned women and girls from universities and schools, effectively strangling their employment hopes.

Women have also been barred from parks and gyms, while beauty salons have been shut down.



– ‘Not allowed’ –



Last year, Taliban authorities imposed vice and virtue laws regulating everyday life for men and women, including banning sales of “any part of the human body” including hair.

They have not said what the punishment for violations would be.

“We must respect the appearance that God has given to humans and preserve their dignity,” Ministry for Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice (PVPV) spokesman Saiful Islam Khyber told AFP.

He said the trading of hair had become “normalised” in the country and that now “selling body parts is not allowed.”

Hair sales are so sensitive that the ministry which handles morality issues burned nearly a ton of human strands in Kabul province in January.

The PVPV said in a statement it burned the batch “to protect Islamic values and human dignity”.

The restrictions have not deterred Fatima, however.

During prayer times, when Taliban officials and forces attend the mosque, Fatima sneaks to a Kabul waste site to hand over her cache of tresses.

The few extra dollars are significant, with 85 percent of Afghans living on less than a dollar a day, according to the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).



– Secret salon –



At a secret salon in Kabul, two worn-out leather chairs sit in a small, cold room where hairdresser Narges now only receives about four customers a week.

Before the 2021 takeover, the 43-year-old widowed hairdresser used to give crop cuts to five to six clients every day.

Now, only the wealthiest of her customers brave visiting the salon, and even they sometimes ask if they can take valuable spare hair home with them.

“They’re the only ones who can still care about beauty,” she said.

For others, the threat of a Taliban punishment is too much to risk.

Wahida, a 33-year-old widow whose husband was a soldier killed in 2021, has a constant worry about how she will feed her three children.

She still collects hair that has fallen from her eight-year-old daughter’s head and her own, with strands from the root more valuable than those cut with scissors.

The unemployed Afghan woman, who now relies almost entirely on charity, stuffs them in a plastic bag to keep them for a potential sale later.

“I had a glimmer of hope when I used to sell my hair. Now that it’s banned, I’m devastated. I’m hoping buyers will come back to my door,” she said, sitting in her home.

“I know there are places to sell. But I am afraid of getting caught there.”

Colombia’s lonely chimp Yoko finds new home in Brazil

“Yoko… is a highly humanized chimpanzee, the degree of tameness is very high… He basically behaves like a child,” 

By AFP
March 24, 2025


On Sunday, 38-year-old Yoko was flown to Brazil to finally join others of his kind at a sanctuary there - Copyright AFP Claire GOUNON

David SALAZAR

Kidnapped from his family as an infant, then raised by a drug lord before ending up in a Colombian zoo, Yoko the chimpanzee has lived the last two years of his life alone.

He lost his last friend, Chita, in 2023 when she escaped from the zoo with Pancho — Yoko’s rival — and the pair was shot dead by soldiers out of human safety concerns.

On Sunday, 38-year-old Yoko was flown to Brazil to finally join others of his kind at a sanctuary there.

But will he make friends?

Yoko is in many ways more human than chimp, his caregivers say. He uses a knife and fork, plays ball, watches television and makes artwork with crayons on paper and canvas.

He is fond of eating sweets and chicken.

Fed junk food by his captor — a narco trafficker whose name has not been divulged — Yoko has only four of his teeth left. Chimps, like humans, are meant to have 32.

It was common for narco bosses such as Pablo Escobar in the 1990s to keep exotic animals as pets, including tigers and lions, and even hippos and giraffes.

Yoko was taught to smoke and dress up in human clothes — causing him to develop a skin disease and lose part of his fur.

“Yoko… is a highly humanized chimpanzee, the degree of tameness is very high… He basically behaves like a child,” said veterinarian Javier Guerrero.

The vet accompanied Yoko on the first part of his journey, dubbed “Operation Noah’s Ark,” from Ukumari Biopark, a zoo in the Colombian city of Pereira.



– A smile is not a smile –



Experts fear Yoko may find it hard to adapt to life with other chimpanzees at Sorocaba in the Brazilian state of Sao Paolo — the largest great ape sanctuary in Latin America.

There are more than 40 other chimps there, but vets and animal behaviorists worry Yoko may not fit in.

“Yoko… is not a chimpanzee in the strict sense… he is an animal that identifies much more with human beings,” said Cesar Gomez, Ukumari’s animal training coordinator.

“To give you an example, a smile is something positive” for humans, “but for chimpanzees, it is something negative and Yoko does not understand these types of communication,” he said.

Yoko was seized from his owner’s lair by police in 2017 after spending an unknown amount of time there, then taken to a refuge that flooded before he became a resident of the Pereira zoo.

“He was denied the chance to be a chimpanzee and grow up with his family,” assistant vet Alejandra Marin told AFP.

In the wild in their natural home in Africa, chimpanzees die at about 40 or 45 years of age. They are social, group animals, and with good care in captivity, they can live up to 60.

The chimpanzee is listed as an endangered species by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

With Yoko’s transfer Sunday, Colombia became the first country in the world to rid itself of entirely captive great apes, said the Great Ape Project, an NGO.

“The great apes are chimpanzees, orangutans, gorillas, and bonobos — none of these species are endemic to our country, and they have no reason to be here,” said Andrea Padilla, a Colombian senator of the Green Alliance who oversaw Yoko’s “deeply symbolic” transfer.

“From a very young age, Yoko was a victim of trafficking and trade, passed from one drug trafficker to another,” she added.

On Monday morning, Padilla posted on X that Yoko had landed in Brazil, and was “safe and sound and about to start a new life with his peers.”

South Korea struggles to contain deadly wildfires


By AFP
March 25, 2025


The level of damage would make the fires collectively the third-largest in South Korea's history - Copyright AFP YASUYOSHI CHIBA

Deadly wildfires in South Korea worsened overnight, officials said Tuesday, as dry, windy weather hampers efforts to contain one of the country’s worst-ever fire outbreaks.

More than a dozen different blazes broke out over the weekend, with the safety minister reporting thousands of hectares burned and four people killed.

“The wildfires have so far affected approximately 14,694 hectares (36,310 acres), with damage continuing to grow,” acting Interior and Safety Minister Ko Ki-dong said.

The extent of damage would make the fires collectively the third-largest in South Korea’s history. The largest was an April 2000 blaze that scorched 23,913 hectares (59,090 acres) across the east coast.

More than 3,000 people have been evacuated to shelters, Ko said. At least 11 people have been seriously injured.

“Strong winds, dry weather, and haze are hampering firefighting efforts,” Ko told a disaster and safety meeting.

The government is “mobilising all available resources”, he said, and today, “110 helicopters and more than 6,700 personnel will be deployed”.

In Uiseong, the sky was full of smoke and haze, AFP reporters saw. Workers at a local temple were attempting to move historical artefacts and cover up Buddhist statues to protect them from possible damage.

The Korea Forest Service said the containment rate for the fire in Uiseong decreased from 60 to 55 percent by Tuesday morning.

More than 6,700 firefighters have been deployed to battle the wildfires, according to the Ministry of Interior and Safety, with nearly two-fifths of the personnel dispatched to Uiseong.

The government declared a state of emergency in four regions, citing “the extensive damage caused by simultaneous wildfires across the country”.

Some types of extreme weather have a well-established link with climate change, such as heatwaves or heavy rainfall.

Other phenomena, such as forest fires, droughts, snowstorms and tropical storms can result from a combination of complex factors.

S. Korea authorities deploy choppers, troops to battle wildfire


By AFP
March 24, 2025


A Korea Forest Service helicopter is used to help extinguish a forest fire near its ignition point in Uiseong - Copyright YONHAP/AFP -

South Korean authorities said Monday they would deploy dozens of helicopters and thousands of firefighters and soldiers as they struggle to control multiple wildfires in the southeast, which have been burning for days.

Four people have been killed so far, with officials warning that high winds and rising temperatures were hindering efforts to put out the blazes.

In Uiseong, nearly 7,000 hectares (17,000 acres) of land has been affected and around 600 people evacuated, Lim Sang-seop, head of the Korea Forest Service, told a press briefing.

“A total of 57 wildfire fighting helicopters are to be deployed to extinguish the fire,” he said, adding that more than 2,600 fire fighting personnel — including soldiers — would be mobilised “to respond with all their might”.

The fire had been partly contained but was still burning as of Monday afternoon.

The forest agency has issued “severe” fire warnings, its highest level, in multiple locations, including North and South Gyeongsang provinces, Busan and Daejeon.

A major wildfire claimed four lives over the weekend in Sancheong county, in South Gyeongsang province, about 250 kilometres (155 miles) southeast of Seoul.

That fire was also partly contained by Monday — but still burning.

The government declared a state of emergency in the affected regions, citing “the extensive damage caused by simultaneous wildfires across the country”.

Prime Minister Han Duck-soo, who was reinstated as acting president earlier Monday, visited the Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasures Headquarters, urging authorities to work together “until the wildfires are completely extinguished”.

“It is a truly heartbreaking incident,” he said, adding that he would meet people affected by the fires later Monday.

The leader of the main opposition Democratic Party, Lee Jae-myung, urged authorities to “mobilise all means at their disposal to quickly and safely suppress the fires” and take further measures to prevent any additional wildfires.

Some types of extreme weather have a well-established link with climate change, such as heatwaves or heavy rainfall.

Other phenomena such as forest fires, droughts, snowstorms and tropical storms can result from a combination of complex factors.